Trump campaign already looking past impeachment with strategy to cash in on it all the way to re-election: report

According to a report from Politico, officials heading up Donald Trump's campaign are looking past his inevitable impeachment trial in the Senate, where it is expected Republicans will protect the president, with a plan to turn it into a plus for his re-election campaign -- including selling impeachment-related merchandise.

"At the heart of the strategy from the Trump campaign and the GOP is a belief that the more Trump and his allies embrace impeachment — framing it as the inevitable outcome of a system run by partisan elites — the more voters beyond the president’s base are likely to gravitate toward that message," the report states, adding. "Together, Trump’s reelection team and the RNC have spent $11 million dollars on impeachment-related ads since the inquiry began on Sept. 24 and they plan to drop another $350,000 on advertising this week, according to the RNC."

Using internal polling, the campaign is reshaping their message to drive up turn-out of Trump 2016 voters who may have cooled on the president -- hoping to fire them up.

"Republican operatives and Trump aides say impeachment has electrified the president’s base heading into an election year. They compare the current moment to last year’s scorched-earth fight to appoint Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court," Politico reports. "Not since sexual assault accusations against the former White House lawyer resulted in the most contentious Senate confirmation process in years have the president’s core supporters been more energized. In their view, Trump — like Kavanaugh — is merely the victim of a smear campaign: guilty of nothing, and targeted only because of ideology and politics."

According to campaign manager Brad Pascale, "This lit up our base, lit up the people that are supporters of the president. They’re frustrated, they’re upset, and that motivates voters."

Noting, "Nearly a half-dozen impeachment-themed apparel items have debuted on the Trump campaign’s website since the inquiry began in September, and a person familiar with the planning said more merchandise is expected in the coming months," the report states that the White House will is making senior Trump aides available for interviews to harp on Trump's impeachment as an attack on the results of the 2016 election.

"In 17 'target states,' or states where the RNC has paid staff on the ground, internal polling conducted last week found that a majority of voters (60%) believe it’s best to wait for the election next year than to proceed with impeaching Trump now (39%). The party also says it has signed up 100,000 new volunteers and seen an uptick in small-dollar donations since impeachment began," the report notes, with one adviser stating they intend to turn impeachment -- and likely acquittal by the GOP-controlled Senate -- into a positive.

“We will continue to milk this for all it’s worth, and we believe that’s a lot in this political climate,” admitted one Trump adviser.

You can read more here.